So you’re sitting around
minding your own damn business when a title slides
towards you that has you a bit a curious. The reason
that this film has piqued your interest is because it
possesses a fairly hefty cast led by Academy Award
winner Forest Whittaker, Academy Award nominee Virginia
Madsen – who will always be Helen to us here at the FCU
no matter how much fantastic work she may do in her post
‘Candyman’ life, and this film also features the
criminally lovely Minnie Driver. The reason this movie
puzzles us a bit is because we’ve never heard of it. Not
that we’re any kind of ‘insider’ or anything that folks
should feel the need to keep us in the loop on what gets
made and released, but we are relatively well informed
on these kinds of things. One, however, should be aware
this film ‘Ripple Effect’, despite its solid cast,
actually stars and was directed by some cat named
Philippe Caland, and though we’ve never heard of this
guy we’ll just go ahead and assume that he’s just one of
the many talented and gifted people that exist out there
who we just haven’t had the pleasure of seeing in
action. After actually watching ‘Ripple Effect’ I’m
afraid that would be a poor assumption on our part. And
though you would think we would have learned our lesson
about making assumptions, we’re going go ahead and make
another one. We assume that the reason we had never
heard of this movie ‘Ripple Effect’ is because it sucks
ass. That’s what we’re going to assume today.

Caland plays the role of asshole fashion
director Amer Atrash whose business seems on the
constant verge of total collapse, not the least of the
reasons being that Atrash is a comprehensive no
account jerk. Since Atrash works so hard to keep his
business afloat, he completely neglects his lovely
wife Sherry (Madsen) to the point that he has
obviously forgotten her name since only refers to her
as ‘baby’ all the time. He’s also neglecting
his four year old daughter who strangely enough also
seems to be named ‘baby’.

Since he is in such dire
straits, Atrash is forced to track down and old but
filthy rich buddy of Gatesian proportions named Brad
(John Billingsly) who he was a total ass to fifteen
years ago, but here he is now begging for money. The
good thing is that Brad is such a sweetheart that he
doesn’t hesitate to float Atrash the loan, the bad thing
is that Atrash has an asshole level so high that he
can’t manage to get of his own way, unfortunately
sending the deal straight into the crapper despite
Brad’s meager request.

The
question is why is this Lebanese immigrant with the hot
wife, the cute kid and tons of loyal employees such a
jerk? The reason is a tragic event that occurred between
a guy named Philip (Whittaker) that he met some years
ago via the hood of his car and the guilt that Atrash
has been carrying around ever since then. Now to cure
himself of his asshole-mania Atrash must face the man he
put in a wheelchair some years ago, and also face this
man’s whore of a folk singing wife Kitty (Driver), and
hope for that there is forgiveness in their hearts.

To
the benefit of Caland and his film ‘Ripple Effect’ it
didn’t suck immediately. As the film started, it looked
as if it had some worth and that something of some
consequence would eventually happen, but about a half an
hour in it became fairly clear that the movie had gotten
about as good as it was going to get. ‘Ripple Effect’
actually felt like a Film School student film because
there was a staged unauthenticated feel to the whole
production with it’s sitcom style lighting, shaky
framing and lethargic pacing. The narrative, as it were,
was completely uninvolving and either lacked substance
or perhaps was so filled with substance that it simply
went over my simple ability to comprehend it. Since the
film was almost completely dialog driven and this dialog
was poorly written and didn’t sound like anything that
anybody born of woman would actually say, the movie was
dull to distraction. Yes the film was filled with great
actors, and not only the afore mention Whitaker, Driver
and Madsen, but also lesser know solid character actors
such as John Billingsly, Kip Pardue and Kali Rocha among
others, but since most of these fine actors were saddled
with either banal dialog or sappy New Age-esque speak,
which admittedly could very well be enlightening to you,
but was pointless drivel to me. Worst still is that
despite the presence of these top-line actors, Philippe
Caland was the lead and dominated most of the screen
time but unfortunately he’s just not much of an actor,
which is only exacerbated by the fact that he’s going
toe to toe in a couple of scenes with Forest freaking
Whitaker.

I
hate too be too hard on this movie because it’s apparent
that this was a labor of love for Caland and his crew,
and he must be a really great guy to convince some of
his good friends, who happen to be famous talented
actors, to participate in his project but that still
doesn’t excuse how lame the project was. I mean I have a
couple of ideas floating around in my head too, but if I
get within 500ft of Virginia Madsen I’ll be picking up
trash on the side of the freeway for the next ten
months. Mr. Caland is probably a very nice man with a
lot of considerable talents, it just seems judging from
‘Ripple Effect’ that acting, writing and directing
aren’t among those talents.